Cassie and Christo

How We Met

Christo and I met on July 5, 2012 on Nantucket’s Surfside Beach. On a whim, a friend and I decided to take the high-speed ferry from Hyannis to Nantucket for the day. We picked up a six-pack of Stella and took a taxi to the beach. After a dare from his uncle to go talk to the girls sitting nearby, Christo came over and introduced himself.

Turns out, we not only grew up in the same small town (Weston, Massachusetts); but we lived on the same street (Boston Post Road) our whole lives — 10 houses away from one another — and never knew each other until that moment (though we probably passed each other many a time in Weston High School’s small halls). I knew the second I met him that we had something special. People talk about feeling that spark — I did. At the time, I was living in Pennsylvania working at Men’s Health magazine. He was in school at Harvard. Two weeks after meeting, he called and asked me to a Red Sox game. I drove the five hours back from PA for the game. We’ve been together ever since.

After taking cars and planes and trains and buses between PA and Boston, including stints in Spain (him) and New York City (me); two years ago, I decided to move home to Boston. I quit a job at Shape magazine in Manhattan to pursue a career in freelance writing. Christo emptied out my fourth floor NYC walk-up apartment while I worked my last day and that night, we drove a U-Haul back to Boston. I cried when we crossed the Massachusetts line.

Today, we live in Boston’s Fenway neighborhood, a stone’s throw from where our first date took place. We do just about everything together.

how they asked

Post-Patriots game on Sunday, Christo asked if I wanted to do a picnic down on the Charles River, near an area we run to often. We ordered a pizza, grabbed a bottle of wine, and walked down to the Charles. After a few minutes — and him acting super weird to the point that I just thought he didn’t want to talk — he turned to grab something from his bag and suddenly was down on one knee.

He proposed right there in a very ‘us’ setting: some good food and wine, the height of fall foliage, and the city we love in the background.